Make Me Sustainable, Please!
I have to admit, as much as I preach about the environment, I harbor an awful, nagging sensation deep down inside that I am not as sustainable as I’d like to be.
I routinely leave my home in a mad morning rush for work, forgetting to shut off the ceiling fan. I agonize over which is worse, tossing out clear plastic bags, or using water to wash them. My laptop is on 24/7. The microwave I never use is perpetually plugged in. In fact, every single electronic item I own seems to be plugged in, always. I realize I have too many electronic gadgets that I dread to imagine buried in a landfill. I also happen to love international travel - and I know that no matter how eco I am, the jet fuel gets me every time.
I hope and pray to meet someone who can take me by the hand and Make Me Sustainable.
Fortunately, there’s now a Web 2.0 application that can help make us all be sustainable. Make Me Sustainable is a Web site that calculates your carbon footprint and allows you to set goals and take actions that will reduce your ecological impact.
You start off by selecting some basic indicators about your home and transportation. It then calculates your carbon footprint and energy costs.
What’s interesting is that its calculator, or Carbon and Energy Portfolio Manager (CEPM), will track monetary savings incurred through footprint reducing actions, as well as calculate your carbon reduction per year in tons. Even niftier, to highlight your real-world impact, it translates your reductions into estimated number of trees saved and number of cars taken off the road.
According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), the average American’s carbon emission is 20 tons. In order to offset 20 tons of carbon, 1,263 American motorists would have to stop driving for one day.
Even with 3 long international flights a year, at 7.9 tons, perhaps I’m not so bad after all.
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